chapter 15 - moral development and aggression

Question 1

morality

Answer 1

a set of principles or ideals that
- help the individual distinguish right from wrong
- to act on this distinction
- to feel pride in virtuous conduct and guilt (or other unpleasant emotions) for conduct that violates ones standards

Question 2

what are the 5 different moral foundations that human morality rests on

Answer 2

• care
• fairness
• loyalty
• authority
• sanctity/purity

Question 3

what are moral foundations

Answer 3

innate origins of human morality that results from various adaptive challenges in evolutionary history

Question 4

what are moral rules

Answer 4

standards of acceptable and unacceptable conduct that focus on the rights and privileges of individuals

Question 5

what are social-conventional rules

Answer 5

standards of conduct determined by social consensus that indicate what is appropriate within a particular social context

Question 6

what is the anthropologist view on the moral domain

Answer 6

• humans are born to become moral beings
• this is evident in their capacity for empathetic feelings and compassion, their social preference for helpfulness and their spontaneous helping behaviour

Question 7

empathy

Answer 7

the ability to experience the same emotion as other people

Question 8

sympathy/compassion

Answer 8

the ability to feel sorrow or concern for another

Question 9

sympathetic distress

Answer 9

feelings of sympathy or compassion that may be elicited when we experience the emotions of (i.e. empathize with) a distressed other

Question 10

self-oriented distress

Answer 10

feeling of personal discomfort or distress that may be elicited when we experience the emotions of (i.e. empathize with) a distressed other; thought to inhibit altruism

Question 11

prosocial helping

Answer 11

14 to 18 month old toddlers are eager to help
- they engage in helping behaviour without being asked to do so and without being offered a benefit in return
- intrinsic motivation to help others forms an important evolutionary basis for human altruism

Question 12

internalization

Answer 12

the process of adopting the attributes or standards of other people - taking these standards as ones own

Question 13

mutually responsive relationship

Answer 13

parent-child relationship characterized by mutual responsiveness to each other’s needs and goals and shared positive affect

Question 14

committed compliance

Answer 14

compliance based on the child’s eagerness to cooperate with a responsive parent who has been willing to cooperate with him or her

Question 15

situational compliance

Answer 15

compliance based primarily on a parents power to control the childs conduct

Question 16

moral self-concept training

Answer 16

• can be an effective alternative to punishment as a means of establishing inhibitory controls
• more effective when combined with praise for desirable conduct

Question 17

social-modelling influences

Answer 17

• parents could establish inhibitory controls in their older children by appealing to their maturity
• persuade them to serve as models of self-restraint for their younger siblings
• being a role model makes them more likely to follow rules

Question 18

premoral period

Answer 18

preschool years, little concern for rules

Question 19

heteronomous morality

Answer 19

ages 5 to 10, view rules of authority figures as sacred and unalterable

Question 20

autonomous morality

Answer 20

by 10 to 11 years, realize that rules are arbitrary agreements that can be challenged and changed with consent of the people they govern
- they understand that breaking the rules to help somebody is okay

Question 21

what are the 3 substages to kohlbergs theory of moral development

Answer 21

1. preconventional morality
2. conventional morality
3. postconventional morality

Question 22

what is preconventional morality and what are its substages

Answer 22

morality based on consequences
1. stage 1: punishment-and-obedience orientation
2. stage 2: naive hedonism

Question 23

what is conventional morality and what are its substages

Answer 23

desire to gain others’ approval
1. stage 3: “good boy” or “good girl” orientation
2. stage 4: social-order-maintaining morality

Question 24

what is postconventional morality and what are its substages

Answer 24

principles of justice
1. stage 5: social-contract orientation
2. stage 6: morality of individual principles of conscience

Question 25

empirical support for kohlberg’s theory

Answer 25

• levels and stages are universal
• longitudinal evidence: individual children progress through the moral stages in precisely the order that kohlberg said they should
• cognitive prerequisites are essential for morality to develop
• social-experience hypothesis: social experiences promote moral growth by introductory cognitive challenges to one’s current reasoning

Question 26

criticisms of kohlberg’s approach

Answer 26

• gender bias
• link to moral conduct
• understimates young children; internal moral motivation slowly emerges in childhood years

Question 27

mechanisms of moral disengagement

Answer 27

cognitive reframing of harmful behaviour as being morally acceptable

Question 28

aggression

Answer 28

behaviour performed with the intention of harming a living being who is motivated to avoid this treatment

Question 29

reactive aggression

Answer 29

aggressive acts for which the perpetrators major goal is to harm or injure a victim

Question 30

proactive aggression

Answer 30

aggressive acts for which the perpetrator’s major goal is to gain access to objects, space, or privileges

Question 31

relational aggression

Answer 31

acts such as snubbing (rude), exclusion, withdrawing acceptance, or spreading rumours that are aimed at damaging a victims self-esteem, friendships, or social status

Question 32

aggression in infancy

Answer 32

proactive aggression appears by the end of the first year
- infants have conflicts over toys and other possessions

Question 33

aggression in childhood

Answer 33

aggression becomes less physical and increasingly verbal (teasing/tattling)
- somewhat less proactive

Question 34

sex differences in aggressive behaviour

Answer 34

• aggressiveness is a quite stable attribute for both males and females
• boys more physically and verbally aggressive than girls

Question 35

what types of aggression increase in girls and boys during adolescence

Answer 35

• relational aggression increases in girls during adolescence (gossip/rumours)
• antisocial aggression increases in boys during adolescence

Question 36

coercive home environment influence on aggression

Answer 36

a home in which family members often annoy one another and use aggressive or otherwise antisocial tactics as a method of coping with these aversive experiences

Question 37

negative reinforcer on aggression

Answer 37

any stimulus whose removal or termination as the consequence of an act will increase the probability that the act will recur
- aids in maintaining coercive interactions in families and increasing aggression in children

Question 38

methods in controlling aggression in young children

Answer 38

• creating “nonaggressive” play environments
• relying on control procedures such as time-out and the incompatible response technique
• implementing social-cognitive interventions